Chickens are starting to appear in larger and larger numbers in animal shelters. Animal shelters? Really?

Really really. This is a real story. The story goes on to say that people no longer want their chickens after the birds have stopped laying eggs, and just don’t know what to do with them! Are we really spending tax payer dollars, or donor dollars, on abandoned chickens because people do not know what to do with them?

My wife and I have backyard chickens. When these chickens stop laying eggs, they are not going to become pets. They are not going to be dumped on some poor overworked/underfunded animal shelter. And they are not going to be dumped in some neighborhood like a college kid’s puppy that is no longer wanted because summer break has arrived. This is a real problem. Yes, sadly Country Catches Critical Chicken Crisis (c5) is not a joke. This is a reflection of the super-modernized, super-sanitized culture we live in. People sit at their computer screens, distant from the “dirty” processes that make the real world run.

“The majority of them are going to be backyard birds that have been either abandoned or dumped,” he said. “Usually, no one wants roosters, and the hens we get are usually spent hens. People don’t know what to do with their old hens. I’ve picked them up at apartment complexes, parks, or I get calls from the Humane Society or animal control.”–OPB

Well, there is an old fashioned remedy that has been passed down for generations which can deal with c5. And I’m going to share it with you, here… for free!! That’s right! You won’t need to purchase a membership, buy a poorly written book, or attend a seminar in Las Vegas.

The Remedy to c5 is… (drum roll please): It’s called chicken dinner. I know some of you may not have realized that chicken dinner is made from chickens. You probably thought chickens grew on trees or were manufactured by a new Monsanto wonder plant. But in reality, chicken dinner is made from chicken.

First, you kill the chicken (yeah, this is old school). Second, you pluck the chicken. Third, you gut the chicken. Fourth, you prep the chicken for cooking (my wife normally does this, and it is an overnight process). Fifth, prep the chicken via your favorite recipe and then toss it in the oven/skillet/crock pot. Sixth, you EAT the chicken. For some of you, this old fashioned method of what to do with chickens after they have stopped laying eggs may seem a bit barbaric. Well grow up. At the very least you could sell them on craigslist to someone else that will eat them.

Think before you get chickens. If you want backyard chickens but don’t have the stomach to eat them, then you shouldn’t get backyard chickens. What’s the problem with eating chickens? I mean seriously… chicken tastes like… chicken.

French people might enjoy horse meat every now and again, but the British, as a rule, do not. Nor do the Irish. And they certainly do not enjoy the idea that their juicy cow hamburger is actually a juicy horseburger. But when the Food Safety Authority of Ireland tested a bunch of burgers for DNA contents, it found not only traces of pig DNA in a bunch of cowburgers, but burgers that were 29 percent horse meat.

No one’s sure quite how this happened. The pig DNA’s easy to explain: Pork and beef get processed in the same facility, and some pig particles sneak into the beef. But the horse meat? Ireland’s agriculture minister said that at one processor in Northern Ireland, “an imported additive used to make the burger” had horse meat in it. (Sounds a little pink slimy to us.)

So my wife walked into the backyard today, and found these crawling in the grass and on the path. We didn’t even know the rabbit was pregnant!! The mother rabbit pulled fur “after” giving birth… thankfully we didn’t step on any of the them. They all seem healthy and doing fine.

This is an update on the chickens. In approximately two weeks, we will begin butchering the white chickens (Cornish Cross). We are keeping the Ameraucana and Rhode Island Red chickens for egg layers. The Cornish Cross have grown freakishly fast in the 6 weeks we have owned them. My wife and I knew that the Cornish would grow quickly, but it is still a surprise. We are going to weigh them tomorrow.

In the video, you can really see the size of the Cornish when they walk next to the milk jug. Currently they eat a half pound of food every day (each). Honestly I know very little about chickens. My wife and I had chickens last year … and we have them this year. But, in total, I still have less than one year of chicken raising experience. These chickens seem healthy… and the egg layers are healthy.

The egg layers are lightning fast too. I wonder if the egg layers are really that fast… or if they look fast when compared to the lumbering Cornish Cross chickens…

My wife spotted a small possum in the chicken run yesterday. I have not seen it yet but we are definitely concerned about it. Possums can eat chickens… and eggs… sigh…

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